updated 07:30 pm EDT, Wed April 27, 2011

$2.2 billion Novell buy-out by Attachmate final

The acquisition of Novell by Attachmate is now complete, as the company's stock will no longer be publicly traded, Datamationreported on Wednesday. Novell is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Attachmate and part of the deal involves selling 882 patents to CTPN Holdings for $450 million, which was approved by the Department of Justice.

CPTN counts Microsoft, Apple and EMC among its members, and open source purveyors argued the patents could be used to attack vendors of open-source gear. Novell's UNIX copyrights will also be retained.

The DoJ-adjusted deal will see Microsoft sell back back to Attachmate all of the Novell patents that it would have otherwise itself acquired. Attachmate will retain its license for using Novell patents, however.